If my ipad was stolen, how to register my ipad for the stolen goods, and lock the hardware requirements?

That was supposed to read: "Somehow, magically you KNOW the serial number to my device..."

Also - If you have had anything stolen recently you know that law enforcement couldn't care less about stolen goods unless theres blood and a body count.

Serial numbers are easy to come by. People post them in these forums all the time, for instance.

Exactly as varjak paw said. Basically Apple just doesn't want to handle that responsibility in case they stop service on an iPad that isn't actually stolen.

As said, many people post their serial number right here on these forums! But let me give you another example. Your friend uses your device. Looks up the serial number (Settings > General > About > Serial Number, it's very easy), then tells Apple that it's stolen just to play a prank on you.

Ok...ok...LOL,if it can happen it will. Can't argue with that logic.

What about apps like Snuko? It seems like it would be very easy for a savvy thief to defeat.

Here's another scenario. You gift an iPad to your partner. Legally their's. Then you break up. If you were to report it stolen and Apple shut's it down. Point being it's too difficult for any manufacturer to put in the infrastructure to go thru the process of having to identify the truth. A police report is just that. A report. Nothing is proven. The police would need to get a court order from a judge then Apple would be required to supply the info.

Yep... I get it... Too easy for things to go awry. If you haven't gathered by now I despise thieves. Nothing would make me happier than to cut them off at their own game. Unfortunately there seems to be no easy way to do that.

Has anyone had success with Snuko, Gadget track, Undercover or any of these apps intended to foil theives? I know some Mac users have had good success but I haven't seen any stories from iOS users yet.

It seems to me that any thief with half a brain would simply do a recovery sequence on said iPad, iPod, or iPhone and defeat any of these well intended apps by wiping the device clean back to factory settings. It's easy enough to do that. I had to do it myself to my son's iPod because he put a lock code in and couldn't remember what it was. Of course that was with a computer that had aleady been synced with that device... I don't know if it's that simple for someone with a stolen device to do the same thing.

There are videos on youtube outlining the process as well.

woah lets please stop this argument

I think we're long past any debate... Not an argument.

If you have anything to add regarding my question about the apps designed to stop thieves I would appreciate that.

None of the apps are any more secure than the Find My iPhone service. All can rather easily be defeated by anyone who knows what they're doing. The only way any app or service could be rendered even difficult to defeat would put the device at high risk for being permanently disabled, and that is not possible with any iOS device due to the limitations put deliberately into the iOS SDK to prevent developers from being able to put such low-level access into iOS apps (which would open the door to keyloggers and other such spyware which could never be removed).

Nothing more anyone can really say on the subject.

Thanks Verjak... I was hoping for a different answer... But then I was hoping to win the powerball lottery too and somehow I knew I would still be working for a living the next day.

It does make sense that Apple would never allow such low level access to their device. So at this point the victim has to hope he's dealing with an amateur who might connect to a network long enough to have one of those apps send a picture and location. Otherwise the device has a new owner... A thieving scum bag new owner.

I suspect that there might be some Cydia apps that would be more difficult to defeat but I haven't made the decision to jail break my iPad just yet. I don't think there is a JB utility out there yet for the iPad 3 anyway.

Bottom line... Apple products are a tasty target for thieves. Do what you can to make sure you don't feed their habits!

My suggestion would be that if the thief attempts to register the stolen device, the original owner would be notified so that they could take action if they so choose. Apple would simply have to obtain the registration information and provide it to law enforcement if requested. It wouldn't be that big of a deal for Apple to flag it since they capture registration information from every device as someone mentioned here. They wouldn't have to shut down the device, which would tip off the thief that they were on to them, they would just flag it as stolen in their registered users database and notify the original owner. Of course this could only happen if they would accept notification from users that their device was stolen.

That still leaves the problem where I could give my iPad away or sell it, then notify Apple my iPad was stolen. They just can't tell if it's stolen.

Not a problem if you only report it stolen when it is actually stolen and not when you give it away or sell it.